‘Too much at stake’ for Red Bull to quit

Although acknowledging that Dietrich Mateschitz's faith in F1 has taken a blow this season, Christian Horner says Red Bull have "too much at stake" in the sport to walk away.

Earlier this year, on the back of a spate of disappointing results, Red Bull sought to end their partnership with Renault and secure either Mercedes or Ferrari power.

But with both those parties saying no Red Bull's future was in jeopardy as owner Mateschitz threatened to quit unless he had a competitive engine.

After months of negotiations the Milton Keynes squad is now believed to have revived their Renault deal.

Speaking about the new engine deal, team boss Horner said: "Well, we have and agreement in place for next year, so it’s great news that we will be on the grid next year, but unfortunately due to circumstance beyond our control we can’t announce exactly what that is."

The Brit added that Red Bull are committed to Formula 1 long-term especially as Mateschitz not only owns two teams, Red Bull and Toro Rosso, but also the Austrian GP race-track, the Red Bull Ring.

"I think it’s no secret that during the summer that Dietrich Mateschitz became fairly disillusioned with Formula One, with the direction that things were heading. He said in conversations that he’d personally had the undertakings that he had that didn’t come to fruition," he said.

"He is probably the most committed supporter of Formula One over the last ten years, if you look at two grand prix teams, a grand prix on the calendar, the amount of promotion that Red Bull worldwide puts into Formula One, the young driver programmes, investing in youth and young talent, more than probably 1500 employees across the different teams and markets, regarding the two Formula One projects.

"So for Red Bull it’s a major major part of their promotional budget spend, that is committed to Formula One, and I think that during the summer months or the latter part of the summer, he was seriously concerned with the direction the sport was heading and what the return of Formula One could ultimately provide.

"I think that having sat and thought about it, he’s decided that there’s too much at stake, that Red Bull have invested so much into the sport that he wants to see the team get back to its former glory. We’ve got some challenges ahead to achieve that.

"I think the current constitution of performance obviously in a power unit dominated formula it’s a difficult situation if you’re not aligned to a competitive power unit at this point in time, so 2016 will be a transitional year for us and I think as hopefully regulations come to fruit or come to bear with the changes that Jean Todt is pushing for, that the promoter is pushing for, to achieve a more affordable, more available power unit, can only be a positive thing for any independent team, not just Red Bull but all the other independent teams that are currently on the grid."